Chessmaster
by Firestar9mm
Summary: The chessmaster's thoughts before the battle. Reviews greatly appreciated...


Chessmaster  
  
*****  
  
The board looked amazing simple. Black and white squares. Two extremes, nothing in between. Yin and yang. Good and evil. Light and dark.  
  
It was more than that. So much more than that.  
  
The board and its tiny armies fascinated him. Nothing was out of place; everything had a set position, a certain number of movements allotted to them. Everything made sense. Here there was calm. Here there was order and right.  
  
He lifted a small white piece in his hand. His hands did not betray all the work it had taken to get him here; they were smooth as sea glass, the hands of a prince.  
  
A pawn. The one he held in his hand now looked exactly like the other nine on the board before him. They waited patiently for orders, still as silence.  
  
The untrained mind might call his army his pawns, but nothing could be further from the truth. He knew they were more, so much more than that.  
  
He tilted the rook, that immovable, unyielding castle, with his slender index finger. Such a strong piece, and yet a castling move would put it in harm's way while the king breathed a sigh of relief in the safe corner. Such a noble sacrifice!  
  
A look of horror had slid behind Barry Burton's eyes when his family had been threatened. Just like that, the trap had been sprung. Sometimes it was didn't take a virus to make someone a zombie. Burton would do anything he was told to do in order to save his family. Anything. Including betray his teammates. He was subject to the chessmaster's every whim.   
  
That chessmaster's fingers drifted from the rook to the stately white queen, poised like an avenging angel for the inevitable kill. The board was hers to dance over as she pleased. All bowed to her.  
  
Even Chris Redfield's eyes--especially HIS eyes--glazed over when Jill Valentine walked into a room. And she knew it. An air of complete control settled around the woman, trailed behind her like a leather jacket, well-loved and much worn. Her looks weren't her only weapons; she had a diamond-bright mind as was as good with a gun as she was beautiful.  
  
The chessmaster's eyes slid from the ice-white queen to the virtuous knight before her. That knight, that pesky knight, his unpredictable movement, the arrogance in his stance. Now THAT was a piece to watch out for, that seemingly innocent stallion.  
  
There was something incredibly arrogant about Redfield, the way he aimed his sidearm--Desert Eagle .50, just as arrogant and strong as he was--the tone of his voice when he spoke. He walked as if sheer strength had seen him through many problems, and maybe it had, but he could still bleed. He could still die. He'd find that out, sooner or later.   
  
Most likely sooner.  
  
The chessmaster cast the white knight aside, the piece skittering with a clatter across the board to drop to the floor with a sound as sharp as a gasp.  
  
It didn't matter what they were, how they moved. Undead pawn, solid rook, stately queen, virtuous knight, they all inevitably had the same purpose--protecting the king. Each and every piece had that same mission, and in the end all were expendable. It didn't matter if one or all were taken, so long as the king survived.  
  
The king would survive.  
  
A smile slashed the blond chessmaster's face. Everything was going according to his strategy. He adjusted his sunglasses, comfortable with the darkness the lenses brought to the world around him.  
  
He stretched lazily in his chair, eyes on the tiny battlefield in front of him, the smile that was not a smile cutting across his face like a wound.  
  
(It's good to be the king...)  
  
*****  
  
Author's Note:  
  
Psychology class is a dangerous place, probably because I have to get up at five a.m. in order to be there by seven a.m. At any rate, no one was more surprised than I when an obviously confused Albert Wesker dropped gracefully into a chair beside me, propping his feet on the desk.  
  
"Are you lost?" I asked.  
  
"I can keep you awake," he promised with a smile that can only be described as oily.  
  
"I bet," I murmured mistrustfully, finding a pen. "Why don't you make yourself useful and tell me what's on your mind?"  
  
He did; it turned into this story. I lost him in the hall on the way to sociology, but somehow I feel I haven't seen the last of him.   
  
Please review! I accept reviews of all kinds; please be constructive, okay? *^_^* 


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